Google Nexus 3 Android smartphone on its way

Google’s Nexus handset range is to get a 3rd generation model, the search giant’s have revealed at their annual I/O conference.

Andy Rubin, SVP of Mobile at Google and head of their Android arm, said that the company are keen to continue to lay down the hardware benchmark for phone’s carrying the operating system.

“The Nexus has been the thing that we used to set the bar, and there’s always going to be new ones coming out in the market,” said Rubin.

“We’ll make an announcement at some point in the future.”

Though he didn’t elborate further, there are a few things we can guess about the Nexus 3 by looking back at previous models. Firstly, they seem to be shipping annually in Q1, January to be specific. Secondly, they act as the first handset to get the major Android updates, so you could imagine the newly-revealed Ice Cream Sandwich android build to hit Nexus 3 phones before anywhere else.

So a January 2012, Nexus 3 with the Ice Cream Sandwich build of the OS is a very real possibility.